This is from a January 22 George Weigel column published in the Tidings, LA archdiocese.This past Dec. 28, I was jolted out of my morning fog at 8 a.m. Mass when the deacon offered this petition:"For those who are considering abortion: may our prayers and the intercession of the Holy Innocents whom we honor today help them choose life as the best option, let us pray to the Lord."

I can't remember whether I blurted "What?" loud enough to be noticed by my faithful companions at daily Mass - many of whom wear hearing aids - but I know I certainly didn't answer with the prescribed "Lord, hear our prayer."

The best option? Oh, so the decision whether to carry a child to term is a pragmatic calculation, and we're to pray that those concerned get the calculation, er, right? How did this morally degrading nonsense get written? How did it get past an editor with any theological grain of sense?

It happened because the parish I was attending, like many others, uses canned general intercessions for weekday Masses, bought from a "liturgical aids" service: the daily intercessions come with a tacky binder in a tear-'em-out-after-you-use-'em format, they fit neatly inside the ambo - so why not?

Well, Dec. 28 illustrated why not: because more often than we'd like to admit, these intercessions are thoughtlessly written, reflecting the ambient cultural smog rather than the truth of Catholic faith. Moreover, they're typically organized to suggest that the world of politics is, somehow, the real world: after a brief intercessory nod to the pope, the bishops or both, we're immediately invited to pray for sundry social and political causes, never identified as such but wrapped in the gauziness of Feel Good Prayer.It's simply impossible for drivel like this to be inserted into the Traditional Latin Mass. Yet another reason as to why any serious, discerning Catholic should turn their back, if not run screaming from, the Protestant-inspired Novus Ordo Missae.

After all, the TLM is built on a foundatin of rock. The Novus Ordo, of quicksand. Anyone ever actuall read the rubrics for the N.O.? Way too many loopholes big enough to drive a Mac truck through. And it's all perfectly legit.

6 Comments:

Most troubling to me are the Catholics who KNOW BETTER and have the GREGORIAN RITE available to them within a few miles and yet they subject themselves and their families to the wiles of the devil week after week. Not to mention the sad, sad fact that they are willing to partake in something they know is inferior, degrading and very often downright evil. Now how pleasing do you think THAT is to the Almighty?

I have a friend, who likes to shout out "controversial" prayers during this time, you know, prayers that shouldn't be controversial? One of his favorites is getting the entire Church to say amen for the "conversion of the Jews". Were we all that brave...

What exactly is George Weigel's problem with that specific prayer. Fulton Sheen asked all the faithful to pray for women who are considering abortion."Jesus, Mary and Joseph, I love you very much, I beg you to spare the life of the unborn child, whom I have spiritually adopted and who is in danger of abortion".Bp Fulton Sheen

Asides from that, there is no question that TLM is a far more reverent mass than NO.